Stoke City 0-0 Chelsea – Early points dropped as Villas-Boas seeks cutting edge
   Britannia Stadium, Stoke
Andre Villas-Boas tasted life as a Premier League manager for the first time as his Chelsea side played out an entertaining stalemate with Stoke City at the Britannia Stadium.
The opening exchanges were played at a high tempo, with Spaniard Fernando Torres - who was somewhat controversially preferred to Didier Drogba in attack - looking sharp early on. The widely popular 4-3-3 system, which served Villas-Boas so well at Porto last season, saw Fernando Torres flanked on either side by Florent Malouda and Salomon Kalou. However, Chelsea lacked creativity throughout the opening 45 minutes as Malouda and Kalou struggled to have any sort of impact on the game.
At the opposite end, the Chelsea back four looked organised and well-drilled as they dealt with the aerial bombardment that teams have come to expect when visiting the Britannia Stadium.
Despite failing to create any significant chances of their own in the first half, the home side successfully prevented Chelsea finding their rhythm with an impressive work rate in all areas of the pitch.
The second half began much like the first, with Chelsea growing more and more in confidence as the game started to open up. As a result of this, Florent Malouda and Salamon Kalou became increasingly involved with a lot of space becoming available in wide areas.
Chelsea’s increased dominance led to a number of penalty claims, all of which were waved away by referee Mark Halsey. However on reflection, Frank Lampard may well have had a case when he was sent tumbling to the ground by Marc Wilson.
When influential Potters duo Matthew Etherington and Rory Delap both suffered injuries and were replaced within the space of 10 minutes by Danny Pugh and Dean Whitehead, Stoke appeared to lose their shape, allowing Chelsea to test goalkeeper Asmer Begovic on a more regular basis, with the Bosnian international forced to pull off a string of impressive saves.
The anticipated introduction of Nicolas Anelka and Didier Drogba surprisingly had very little impact on the game, as the visitors struggled to adapt to a new system as Malouda and Kalou were those to make way. Further evidence that Fernando Torres and Didier Drogba are perhaps best kept apart.
The closing stages were played out with Chelsea forcing the issue like they had for much of the second half, however. They lacked a cutting edge in the final third and the points were shared. All in all, a satisfying result for Stoke manager Tony Pulis while Andre Villas-Boas will no doubt have learnt plenty from his first Premier League game in charge after his side produced an assured performance but lacked the spark they’ll need if they are to become champions of England once again.
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